Before Battlefront
by Kazuki Naruse
Summary: This is a prequel to the anime. Each chapter will (hopefully) introduce a new character and how Yuri met them before Battlefront was formed. Please review! I hope you like it! :D
1. Iwasawa

She woke up on cold, lumpy ground. Small rocks dug into her back and arms. The sky above her was blue and dotted with puffy white clouds. The air was cold and smelled liked dust and rain. She felt tired and stiff, as though she'd been asleep for centuries.

She closed her eyes, searching her memory to find her current whereabouts.

She couldn't.

She had no memory of falling asleep. In fact, she had no memories before falling asleep either. She only had the memory of waking up. Everything else was a complete blank.

Time passed. She didn't know how much. She didn't care. Time no longer meant anything. Nothing really mattered.

"Who am I?" she wondered aloud. She spoke in a voice she didn't recognize, a voice she didn't know.

The sky began to darken. More time had passed.

A voice spoke. It was not her voice. The voice was not connected to anything. It floated in the air above her, spoken words riding on the gentle, cool wind. When they finally reached her ears, she recognized that the voice was female, monotone, and somewhat high. "You cannot sleep here." it said. "You must rise and get to the dorms."

The words swam around in her head. They made sense as separate words, but they were lost as a sentence.

A face appeared; a face she assumed accompanied the voice she had heard. Long white hair shrouded a pale, girly face. Wide, silver eyes stared at her, lacking all emotions. She wore a school uniform, rather plain and tan but well kept. She had an armband around her upper right arm. It was pinned on and stood out on the pale fabric. "Please get up." the voice spoke again, words coming out in sync with the movement of her lips.

"Sorry!" Another voice spoke. It wasn't the white-haired girl's voice. It was a female voice, one that sounded very familiar. She felt the muscles in her face move. She had been the one who had spoken. The word had come out on its own, probably from some old habit.

She propped herself up on her elbow. She could see that the ground beneath her was gravel, rocks jutting out from the cold, dark surface. Magenta hair fell over her eyes, shrouding her vision in darkness. The darkness disappeared as she sat up, receding along with her hair.

She noticed she was wearing the same uniform as the white-haired girl. The only difference was the armband. Her uniform was missing the armband.

The white-haired girl was staring at her, a blank yet intimidating look on her face.

"Where am I?" Pushing her magenta hair further away from her face, she stood up. She looked around her.

To her right were stairs leading up to a large white building with many windows. Two wide glass doors adorned the middle of the bottom half of the building. The hallway connected to them was pitch black, shrouding the contents of the building in mystery.

To her left was a track field. Only two people remained, still running laps on the red lanes.

Behind her was a bridge, though she couldn't see what the bridge was connecting.

"This is a school. You should be in the dorms. Please go to the dorms." She still spoke in the same monotonous tone, never wavering in the slightest.

"Where are the dorms?"

The white-haired girl pointed to the large building with the glass doors. She didn't say anything more, merely walked off towards the track.

"Thanks for your help." The magenta-haired girl muttered under her breath, her words soaked in sarcasm.

She spent the next half hour trying to locate the Dorm Advisor's office to ask which room she was supposed to go to. As she was walking down one of the large, dimly lit hallways, she was so preoccupied with staring at the doors that she hadn't seen the pink-haired girl walked in the opposite direction, tuning her guitar.

They walked right into each other, neither of them realizing what had happened until they hit the ground. The pink-haired girl clung to her guitar, cushioning its fall.

"I'm sorry! I-I" the magenta girl stammered.

"It's fine; I should have been watching where I was going." Getting up, she examined her guitar, carefully turning it over to check for any scratches. She nodded to herself, slipping the wide leather strap over her shoulder. "I'm Iwasawa." She said, holding out her left hand. "And you are?"

"Yuri" was the answer. "Yuri Nakamura." The name felt familiar, the string of syllables forming easily in her mind. She had spoken those syllables many, many times. Those syllables formed her name. She didn't know how she had remembered her name when she had no memories, but she knew she was right. She shook hands with Iwasawa.

"Nice to meet you. You're new here, aren't you?" She smiled, strumming a chord on her guitar.

"How did you-" Yuri started.

"You're looking for the Dorm Advisor." She said. "Nobody walks these halls otherwise. This part of the building is pretty much abandoned." She looked up at the dim lighting as she spoke.

Yuri looked around. The hall didn't seem abandoned. The floor was clean and the walls were freshly painted a pretty lime green color. The doors were adorned with shining plates dictating the room numbers. Every door was made out of a deep, polished mahogany.

"Are you new too then?" Yuri asked, confusion plaguing her thoughts.

"Nah, I come here because these halls are the quietest. The residents in the rest of the dorms are too loud; it's hard to concentrate." She paused, glancing at Yuri. "The Dorm Advisor is gone by now; it's really late." She strummed her guitar again, reaching up to tune one of the strings as she spoke.

"Oh…"Yuri looked down, simultaneously disappointed and anxious. Where would she go?

She took a big step back, getting ready to leave when Iwasawa spoke again. "I have a spare bed in my room." She tuned another string. "My roommate…" she paused, trying to find the most accurate wording. A flash of sadness passed over her face. "…left recently." Yuri looked up at her. Their eyes met; Yuri's anxious and Iwasawa's calm and apathetic. "You can stay with me tonight." She finished her sentence with a nod.

Yuri bowed gratefully. "Thank you so much!" When she faced Iwasawa again, she only saw Iwasawa's back as she started walking away down the hall. Yuri quickly followed, running to catch up but staying one foot behind the guitarist as she walked.

Iwasawa's room was rather large, for a dorm room. There were two beds, pushed up against parallel walls. One was littered with items, from papers to books. Covers were pushed up against the wall that was crammed with pictures. Most of the pictures seemed to be album covers. In between the pictures were sheets of music scribbled in pen with lyrics and notes in the margins.

The other bed was neatly made with white sheets and a white pillow sitting at the head of the bed. It was clear that the bed had never been used. Everything was brand new. Yuri found this strange, but chose not to question it.

"That's your bed." Iwasawa said, pointing to the neat bed while sitting on the messy one. I hope you don't snore…" She said, raising an eyebrow at Yuri.

"I don't." Yuri assured, chuckling nervously. She closed the door behind her and took a few steps into the room. Anxiety knotted and unknotted her fingers. It kept her frozen in place, standing in the middle of the floor, on a dusty white carpet.

A searing pain suddenly erupted in the middle of her forehead. She lurched forward, holding her head with her right hand. The pain spread quickly, enveloping her head in a terrible throbbing she knew she had never experienced before. She felt her knees buckles and hit the ground as the room began spinning. She reached down with her free hand but missed the floor. Everything became dark.


	2. Yuri's Memories

Yuri was falling though a murky darkness full of pain, guilt, and loneliness.

She was falling towards a bright light, full of colors. She didn't know what was in that light, but she knew she didn't want to go to it.

She tried pushing away from it, but there was nothing for her outstretched arms to push against.

She hit the floor. It was wooden, not carpeted. She was no longer in the same room.

Instinctively, she sat up, relieved that there was a ground beneath her fingers.

She heard children laughing and small, high voices speaking excitedly.

One voice stopped her before she looked up It was her voice; a little higher, but still hers. She wasn't speaking though. She hadn't spoken a word.

So who had?

Her eyes met the back of a girl's head. The small girl's hair was magenta, the same shade as her own. She was very short, obviously young.

The girl giggled, standing in front of three very small children.

Yuri wasn't paying attention to what the magenta-haired girl was saying. She looked from one bright, smiling face to the next. The more she looked at the children, the stronger the urge to cry became. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. She bit her lip to keep herself from wailing. The tears rolled down her face, cutting patterns into her otherwise dry cheeks.

Why was she crying? she wondered. Everyone was happy and yet she was bursting into tears. Why?

She caught sight of her reflection in the wide screen television sitting across from her. Her eyes were bright green despite the tears. Her hair reached her shoulders. It latched onto her tears, strands flinging themselves over her sharp cheekbones. Her skin was pale, nearly white in comparison to her dark hair. She looked rather sickly.

The magenta-haired girl turned around to face to adults behind Yuri, talking excitedly.

Yuri saw the girl's face. Her eyes grew wide.

The face she saw mirrored her own. The girl's eyes were the same bright green. Her cheekbones arched in the same way. Her skin was equally pale though she didn't look ill. She appeared to be happy and healthy.

Yuri instantly realized she was looking at a younger version of herself. Everything she saw around her was familiar.

Slowly, ever so slowly, details trickled into her mind.

This was her house.

She was in the living.

The three children sitting on the couch were her siblings.

She had been asking her parents if she could spend the night at a friend's house.

She couldn't remember the answer. She couldn't even remember the name of her friend or what they looked like.

Yuri's eyes closed on their own. She saw the light behind her eyelids fade. It returned a moment later, but it was considerably weaker. She opened her eyes.

The sun was setting outside the large window to her left.

She knew it was summer. Her younger self and her siblings were watching television. Her parents had left the house to run a few errands. She was left in charge of her brother and sisters.

She glanced at the grandfather clock. It was late afternoon.

A feeling of dread bubbled inside Yuri. She instantly knew something was going to happen. Guilt and sadness pulsed through her veins.

A subtle scratching sound came from the door behind Yuri. She turned to look, struggling to breathe as her chest grew tighter.

The door violently burst open. She turned to the couch and saw her younger self jump up, startled and scared. Her infant brother began wailing instantly, terrified of the loud noise.

Five men walked into the house, dressed in heavy clothing with large boots that made loud clicks when they walked. All of them wore black ski masks.

The younger Yuri whispered urgently to her younger siblings, telling them to stand up. She quietly ushered them towards the wall to the left of the large antique grandfather clock. She wrapped her arms around all three of them, shielding them as best as she could with her small, thin body.

Yuri watched her younger self, remembering the fear and desperation that had paralyzed her. She remembers the warmth of their trembling bodies and the sound of their muffled sobs. She remembers how much she had wanted to protect them.

Yuri watched the robbers ransack the living room. They lifted the couch cushions and tore them apart. They searched the drawers and cabinet beneath the television. The television crashed to the ground and the robbers smashed it to bits, searching the rubble for anything of interest.

The robbers regrouped and spoke quietly. Even though Yuri was only a foot from them, she heard them as though she was at the other end of the room, where the younger Yuri was huddling. A pounding muffled her hearing.

One of the robbers broke away from the rest. He walked right over to the younger version of Yuri. She ducked her head and hugged her siblings tighter, wishing everything would disappear and she would awaken from this nightmare. The man reached down and grabbed her arms, his meaty fingers easily wrapping around her thin wrist. He roughly pulled her to her feet and dragged her away from her brother and sisters.

"Little girl, you're the eldest, right?" A different robber said, smirking down at Yuri. "Your parents must have told you were the valuables are, right?" Yuri hadn't seen the robber's face. She was too scared to look up at the man speaking to her. 'Like,"he continued, his voice low and close to her ears. "'if there's an earthquake, grab these and run' or 'if robbers come, give them these and ask them to leave.' I'm sure your parents must've told you something, right?"

There was a pause.

A quiet, trembling voice replied "I don't know." Then, more desperately, "I don't know anything about that!"

As if by some invisible signal, two of the robbers broke away and walked towards the three siblings. Yuri wanted to scream, to yell at the robbers to get away from them. She wanted to run at the robbers and pull them away, to drag them out of her house, out of her life. She desperately wanted to protect her siblings.

She couldn't, not then, not now. She had been frozen on the floor, forced to watch the scene play out in front of her. She still was. She still couldn't move.

The three children were arranged in a row, side-by-side in front of the grandfather clock.

"Well then, go and look." The robber said, his voice threaded with annoyance. "If we don't like what you find, you'll be saying goodbye to these kids, one by one."

Another robber finished. "You've got ten minutes apiece. Go find something good in ten minutes."

She couldn't hear anything anymore. She didn't want to listen. The meanings of the words were too terrible to imagine.

Suddenly, Yuri saw everything through the eyes of her younger self. She saw the walls rushing past her as she ran upstairs. She saw the floor get closer to her as she looked beneath the bed and furniture in her parent's bedroom. She watched each box and drawer being opened by small, trembling hands.

She glanced at the clock. She had to find something quickly. She had to. She just had to. There was no other possibility. She had to.

She spun around, trying to look at everything at once. A large vase caught her eye. It was a large, antique vase, the biggest in the house. It had to be valuable, right? It had to appease the robbers; it had to.

She wrapped her arms around the cold porcelain vase and slowly slid it off its pedestal. It was heavy. Her skinny arms had trouble gripping it.

She barely see over the top of the vase. The walls seemed so much closer than they should be. She desperately wanted to avoid the walls. A single scratch could ruin the vase. A single scratch could ruin everything.

She knew where the stairs were. She knew exactly how many steps from the bedroom doorway to the first step.

Carefully, ever so slowly, she balanced on one foot, propping the vase on her thigh as she lowered her other foot to the wooden step.

Her foot hit the polished oak.

She was running out of time. She very she had very few minutes left. She had to make it down the stairs quickly. She had to save her siblings.

She hastily balanced on the wooden board, lowering her foot to the next step. She missed, the front-most half of her foot hanging in open air. She tried to shift her foot backwards.

She couldn't.

She involuntarily leaned forward.

She couldn't catch her balance.

She pitched forward.

Time seemed to slow down. The small section of the room that she could see over the rim of the porcelain vase was moving. The walls were rushing past her.

Family portraits caught her eye as they moved away from her, staying behind her and smiling blankly at the wall parallel to them. The family seemed so happy, so peaceful, so full of life..

She felt the bottom of the porcelain vase hit one of the oak steps. The shock reverberated through her fragile bones.

She heard the first crack loud and clear. It echoed through her head. The sound sent a chill down her spine. She wished she could shut her ears and disappear as the dreaded sound of shattering porcelain cut through the still air.

The glossy white fragments dug into her arms, legs, and torso. Their sharp edges cut through her thin skin. Shards got trapped in her flesh as she fell.

She hit the wooden step headfirst. The next one bent her spine backwards with a loud crack. Her legs rose up, over her body, propelled by the momentum. Her neck was forcibly bent as her bruised knees whacked against the lowest step. Within a second, her torso and head hit the ground, finally halting her descent.

Sharp pains plagued her body from both the broken vase and the tumbling fall. Porcelain fragments slowed to a stop around her, more of them scattered on the step above her. Their glossy surface reflects her despondence.

She knew she had to get up but she didn't know how to. She couldn't feel her legs. Were they still attached? she wondered. Her arms were heavier than the vase had been. She was too weak to move them. Her vision was blurring. She could barely see the chandelier hanging from the ceiling above her.

The seconds walked past her, ticking by at an agonizingly slow rate. A minute had passed.

A loud pop sliced through the air. She heard it clearly over her pounding headache.

She knew what the sound meant. She felt guilt crushing her. She couldn't breathe.

Tear flowed from her eyes faster than a roaring river.

One of her siblings had been killed.

One of her precious siblings had just been murdered.

It was her fault.

She had failed to protect them.

She had killed them.

She might as well have pulled the trigger.

She had failed, utterly failed.

She had murdered one of her beloved siblings.

She wished she was dead.

She desperately wanted to die, to take their place.

But she couldn't. Not yet. She had to get up. She had to find something. She had to save the others.

She was their big sister. She was supposed to protect them. She had already failed once. She would not fail again. She could not fail again.

She tried to make her body move. She couldn't fell her legs but they had to be there. They had to. She needed them. She needed to find something, something for the robbers. She had to save her siblings.

She strained to move her arms. She tried over and over again to contract her muscles, to force them to move.

She couldn't. It was as though she was encased in cement. She couldn't move at all. Not even a millimeter.

By the time the second bullet was fired, she was frozen. She felt so cold inside, so cold and empty.

By the time the third bullet was fired, leaving all three of her precious siblings cold and lifeless, she was numb. She no longer felt sad. She no longer felt empty. She felt nothing.

She felt nothing as the police, called by a concerned neighbor who had heard the gunshots, came in and arrested the robbers. She felt nothing as she was loaded into an ambulance, surrounded by caring paramedics.

She felt nothing when she woke up after several hours of surgery and stitches. She felt nothing as she looked at her grieving parents and listened to the head doctor explain that her spinal cord had been severed and she would never walk again.

For the last ten years of her life, she felt nothing but guilt.

She felt nothing but guilt as she was released from the hospital in a wheelchair and taken back to the home that would forever be missing three joyful, smiling faces. She felt nothing but guilt as she was wheeled past the walls that had been painted with blood and brain matter.

The antique grandfather was gone.

Her parents never said it. The police never said it. The judge never said it. The reporters never said it. The doctors never said it. Her many therapists never said it; but she knew. She just knew.

It was her fault. She had utterly failed at her one duty as an older sister. She had failed to protect them.

She was no longer an older sister. She was no longer a sister. She would never be a sister again.

She had been robbed of everything that had made her a sister. She had been robbed of everything that gave her life meaning.

In only half an hour, just thirty short minutes, she had been robbed of everything that made her whole. She would never be whole again.

She went through the next nine years of her life on autopilot. She went to school but didn't learn anything. She went to doctors but never healed in any way. She spoke to many therapists, psychologists, and counselors but never felt any better.

In that ninth year, barely a year before her death, she went through another loss. Her mother committed suicide, wracked with guilt time could not erase.

Yuri found her hanging in the master closet, growing colder every second. The freezing numbness returned, locking her in her wheelchair. She couldn't feel anything; not sadness, not anger, nothing.

She stared blankly at her mother's cooling corpse until her father came home. He wheeled Yuri out of the room, crying as he lifted her mother's cold body and slipped the rope from around her neck. Yuri listened from behind the door as he called her therapist to see what he would say.

A week later, Yuri was taken to her mother's funeral. She was wheeled to the open casket at the front of the parlor to say her final goodbye. She was still numb, as frozen inside as her mother's peaceful expression. She had nothing to say. The corpse lying in the coffin stopped being her mother nine years ago. All that was left was an empty shell.

She was sent to more therapists for several months before the funds dried up. Her father lost his job soon after.

A month before her death, a foreclosure notice slid across the dining room table. Her father stared at the paper with a blank expression. They had one month to leave, he told her.

Neither of them would actually leave.

Her father half-heartedly found and applied for many jobs, but never got any of them.

Yuri stopped attending school. She spent the first few days of that last month absentmindedly staring at blank walls.

Halfway through the first week, she wheeled and dragged herself to the closet where her mother had hung herself. The only thing that had been changed was the rope. Her father had taken it down and burned it immediately after the funeral. Everything else had been left untouched.

Yuri's eye was drawn to the bible on the shelf at the top of the closet. The leather cover and the edges of the pages were worn from years of use but dusty from time spent unused.

Prior to her suicide, her mother had been a devout Christian. Religion seemed to help her cope, but it could only do so much.

Yuri had never read the Bible.

She wheeled herself forward and reached up, gripping the leather cover with the tips of her scarred fingers. The Bible fell into her lap.

She spent the next few weeks reading and thinking about the "God" that the holy book spoke of. If this "God" loved and cared for everyone, why would he allow her innocent, sweet, life-loving siblings to be killed in such an evil, heartless way? How could such an omnipotent being be so cruel?

The day before her death she went to church for the first time in her life. She listened to a preacher talking about the omnipotent being known as "God." She decided she would find this "God," if he really existed. She would find out why her precious family was stolen away from her, one by one.

That night her father came home early. He told her they would be evicted the next day. He gave her a glass of warm milk, to help her fall asleep, he said.

She never woke up.

As her last memory faded to darkness, she pieced together the rest. Her father had killed her in her sleep, then killed himself. He never planned to leave the house.

She knew she was right. She knew with an unexplainable certainty that she was right.

A white light greeted her open eyes. Something heavy lay on top of her. She was lying on her back on something soft.

"Got your memories back?" The voice to her left startled her. She suddenly realized she was in an unfamiliar place. She was not at home, with her father on the last night she remembered.

She was certain; absolutely certain, that she was dead. She had died on that last night at home. She knew she was dead.

So why was she at a dorm, in a stranger's room? Why was she lying in a bed with a white comforter pulled over her, wearing a school uniform she had never seen?

"Amnesia's pretty common here." Iwasawa spoke again. Yuri heard soft footsteps coming towards her, muffled by the carpet spread across the floor. Iwasawa's kind face appeared above hers. Yuri felt something soft and gentle on her face and realized it was a tissue, wiping away the tears she had unconsciously cried in her sleep. "If you want to talk about it, I'll listen." Iwasawa disappeared a moment later.

Why was she being so nice? Yuri wondered. She had only met Iwasawa a dozen minutes before she fainted. She had no obligation to help Yuri.

"Where are we?" Yuri asked. Was this some sort of afterlife like the Bible referred to? She knew with certainty that she was dead but…

She began doubting this fact. She was breathing and she could feel her heart beating so… What was really going on?

"School." Iwasawa shrugged. "It's a school for people who died without finishing, I guess."

Yuri looked around, waiting for the information to make sense. To clarify, she asked, "Is it some sort of afterlife?"

"You could call it that." Iwasawa nodded, and then said, "You should get some rest."

Yuri felt her eyelids getting heavy, even though she felt like she had been asleep for ages. She closed her eyes and let the darkness of sleep run over her.


	3. Girls Dead Monster

Morning was bright and noisy. Yuri awoke to a loud knocking on the door. The sunlight flooding through the large dorm room window hurt her sleepy eyes.

"Hey Masami! You're gonna be late for class!" the voice from behind the door was low but definitely female. She knocked again, faster and louder this time.

"Go on ahead!" Iwasawa yelled back, sleepily pulling on her uniform. She crammed books into her bag, running a brush through her pink hair before sliding off the bed and sprinting to the door. "Go to the student council room at three. They'll inform you of your classes." Iwasawa said to Yuri as she ran out the door. She left it ajar, sprinting down the hallway to catch up with her friend.

For two hours, Yuri lay in bed, trying to fall back asleep. She stared at the ceiling, watching the sun from the window creep across the ceiling. Every time she closed her eyes they popped back open. Images flashed beneath her eyelids when she blinked. She knew they were more of her memories but she didn't want to remember anything more.

The prospect of sleep was distant by the time Yuri slipped out of bed, sliding her legs over the edge. The time on the clock read quarter to noon.

Her stomach rumbled. She needed food.

She looked around the room, seeing it in a new light. She hadn't been able to get a proper look at the room in the electrical lighting, especially not since she fainted shortly after entering. The light reflected off the pictures hanging on the wall. She saw that most of them were hand drawn. The album covers seemed to belong to rock bands with a mix of dark and vibrant colors encasing each of them.

The music was handwritten with notes in the margins and lines crossing out some of the notes. Lyrics were posted next to most of the music sheets. Yuri leaned forward curiously, her bright green eyes scanning the lines of poetic words. She whispered them under her breath.

Standing straight, she couldn't take her eyes off the music sheets. The lyrics swam in her head without music, without a voice. They were words longing for something more.

The hallway outside the door was empty. The rest of the students must be in the classrooms.

She nervously walked past the other closed doors, wondering if something would jump out at her. She still couldn't understand where she was nor what was happening. Is she really dead? What kind of afterlife is this supposed to be? Why a school?

These questions without answers kept her mind occupied as she made her way to the dorm exit. Next to the glass double doors, she noticed a map of the campus, showing the two dorms and the main buildings. There were large fields for nearly every sport imaginable.

The cafeteria was located at the west end of the main school building. The simplest path was to walk past the large concrete stairs that lead down to the track and the entrance of the main school building.

She saw no one on the short walk until she came to the other end of the wide building that served as a school. There students milled around the wide doors that led to the tall building known as the cafeteria. The building had two levels and windows on nearly every square inch. It gave ample room for the large student body to peacefully sit at tables and enjoy half-assed food bought by meal tickets.

By the time Yuri squeezed through the doors, the room was packed. Most of the tables were filled with students and the few empty seats were soon occupied. Everyone was in a school uniform. Everyone but her, that is, who had remained in her white T-shirt and sweatpants, which were more or less the only form of pajamas here. She immediately felt out of place, a feeling that increased with each curious stare.

She looked around at the long lines of people waiting at counters. Everyone held small white tickets but where had they bought them?

Another scan of the room revealed vending machines at each of the corners. Every single on of them had a long lines of students filed in front of it.

She walked over and stood in one of those lines, thinking watching the people in front of her slowly disappear into the rest of the crowds.

It wasn't until there were only two people left in front of her that she realized she needed money. She checked her pockets, halfheartedly hoping that some money had been stored in there. She found nothing. When her turn came, she nervously looked at the menu options, wondering if anything was free. Nothing. The cheapest thing on the menu was instant ramen; which cost fifty yen. She quickly scanned the floor for fallen coins but... nothing. There was no way she could buy lunch without money...

"Excuse me; is there a problem here?" A voice spoke to her from behind. She whipped around to see the same white-haired girl who had spoken to her yesterday, out on the field. She still had an arm band pinned to the sleeve of her uniform.

"I don't have any money." Yuri blurted out, trying to sound calm and almost casual, indirectly asking for a small favor from the girl she had never met.

"You are holding up the line. If you have nothing to buy, please get out of the line." Her speech was extremely formal and polite.

"Right. I'm sorry." Why had she thought that would work? Of course this girl wouldn't give money to someone she doesn't know.

Yuri had stepped away when she heard the girl say, "Why are dressed in those clothes? Those are not the uniform." She followed Yuri out of the line, standing in front of her with a placid expression on her face. Her eyes were unnaturally wide but held no emotion. Her white hair fell in straight, smooth strands on her thin shoulders.

"I didn't think of getting dressed before coming here." she said, apologetically bowing her head. She looked down at her clothes, then at everyone else's, resenting the way she stood out.

"What is there to think about? You must wear your uniform at all times except in the dorms." She tilted her head questioningly, as though she really couldn't comprehend why Yuri wasn't dressed.

"I didn't know that." Yuri said, her tone losing it's formality. This girl was really starting to get on her nerves. Obviously Yuri was new and confused so why did she have to be so judgmental?

The white-haired girl was about to say something more when a hand pulled Yuri away from behind. Iwasawa appeared in front of her. "It's alright Tachibana, I'll get her up to speed."

"Please make sure you do." The girl, Tachibana apparently, said. She turned around and walked away followed by a few students with similar armbands pinned to their sleeves.

"You sure have guts, taking on Tachibana like that." a voice said behind Yuri. This voice and the hand around her wrist belonged to a girl with shoulder length brown hair and a loud, rather strange voice. It sounded familiar... Almost like the female voice she had heard earlier that morning at the door.

Iwasawa appeared next to Yuri. "That was Kanade Tachibana, the student council president. You do not want to get on her bad side, trust me." As she said this, she glanced at the girl in front of Yuri, sending a short message to her. A second later she pointed to her and said, "This is Hisako. Hisako, this is Yuri, the newbie from yesterday."

"I'd figured that out already." she looked up and down at Yuri's outfit, not in a judgmental or accusatory way, just in a curious way. "Nice to meet you." she held out her hand. Yuri took it and was surprised by her tight grip.

"What do you want for lunch?" Iwasawa said, pulling a wallet out of the pocket of her uniform. "You should try the beef udon. It's decent in comparison to the other food on the menu." She pulled out a small, white piece of paper and held it out to Yuri. "Go over to that counter and had this to the student there, then come right back here."

"But-" Yuri protested. The beef udon was the most expensive meal on the whole menu, costing three hundred yen. She couldn't accept this from someone she had barely just met.

"Go." Iwasawa gave her a small push towards the counter, then crossed her arms to signify she would not take any arguments.

Feeling a little defeated but grateful, Yuri walked towards it. She nervously held the ticket on in front of her as she approached the counter. The guy standing behind it, a student, took the ticket and briefly glanced at it before handing her a bowl from behind the counter. The bow was filled with steamy broth and large, thick noodles. It smelled heavenly to Yuri.

She turned around and walked back to Iwasawa, avoiding the crowds as best as possible as she made her way to the tall pink head in front of her.

Iwasawa led her to a table that was nearly full of people, all of them girls, and gestured to an empty seat, pulling out the chair for Yuri to sit down. When she did, Iwasawa handed her a pack of convenience store chopsticks. "Eat up." she said. "I'll introduce you to the others."

Yuri ripped the chopsticks from their packaging and hurriedly began slurping down noodles. She could not remember ever being this hungry.

"This one's Shiori," Iwasawa said behind her, gesturing to someone diagonally across from Yuri. She had a smile as vibrant as her orange hair. "The girl next to you is Miyuki." She had a much shyer smile that was partially hidden by her lavender hair.

"Don't let that shy act fool you," Shiori said through a mouthful of unidentifiable food. "She's crazy."

"Coming from you, that means less than nothing." Hisako said, sitting beside Shiori. She turned to Yuri, "Whatever you do, don't let her drag you into any of her crazy plans."

Yuri smiled. This was a really tight-knit group, but all of them were very welcoming. They talked to her throughout the lunch period, letting her in on some of their crazy past experiences.

"And that is why the school no longer allows frogs, not even for experiments." Shiori finished just as the bell was ringing. Everyone got up simultaneously, picking up their bowls and trays and walking back towards the counters. Stacks appeared within seconds, nearly reaching the ceiling. A few looked as though they would tip over and crash to the ground, but everything stayed in place.

"You should go back to the dorms." Iwasawa said. "Tachibana'll have a cow if she sees you out of class during school hours. I'll come get you once sixth period is over." she said, reassuringly placing a hand on Yuri's shoulder.

"Alright..." Yuri said, walking towards the entrance of the cafeteria. She waved back to the group as she left.

There were a few students walking around now, but all of them had a destination. All of them were heading towards the entrance of the main school building.

The dorms were empty once again when Yuri arrived. She walked down the narrow hallways towards the room she shared with Iwasawa, sighing as she opened the door. She didn't know what she would do for the next few hours... Was there anything to do?

Indeed there was. She found a book in one of the drawers of the desk between their beds. Seeing no other form of entertainment, she sat down and began reading it, halfheartedly flipping through the pages.

Within five minutes she was hooked. The read through page after page, never looking up from the printed words, not even for a second. The sun outside her window slowly changed positions as she read, bathing the small room in golden light.

Iwasawa walked in silently three hours later. She lowered her backpack to the ground as slowly as possible so it wouldn't make a sound then tiptoed over to where Yuri sat. Amused at Yuri's obliviousness, she leaned over the top of the book.

Yuri jumped, startled. The book leaped from her hands, hitting Iwasawa's chin then falling to the floor with a soft _thud_. "I'm sorry!" she said, tilting her head to get a better look at the damage she had done. Iwasawa seemed unfazed, even as a red line appeared below her lips.

"It's fine." she said. "I shouldn't have done that." Glancing towards the door she added, "You ready to go?"

Yuri stood up, cautiously avoiding Iwasawa's face. She did not want a repeat of what had happened a few seconds ago.

Iwasawa glanced at Yuri's outfit. "Aren't you gonna get dressed? Unless you want to get scolded again..."

"Oh." Yuri looked at her pajamas, then glanced at the spot on the floor where she had discarded her uniform yesterday. "Right."

"I'll be waiting outside." Iwasawa said, walking out the door as she spoke.

It didn't take very long for Yuri to change then walk with Iwasawa to the student council room.

It was a wide, brightly lit room one long, rectangular table in the middle of the room. Chairs occupied by students swarmed the table. Each one of them turned to look at Yuri when she walked in. The room was instantly silenced by her arrival.

Next to her, Iwasawa stood tall and almost intimidating. She spoke loudly, addressing the whole room. "She's new here, arrived yesterday and she doesn't have her schedule yet."

Tachibana, sitting at the head of the table stood. "Name please?" she asked, turning to Yuri.

"Nakamura, Yuri Nakamura." she responded. She watched as Tachibana walked over to a tall filing cabinet at the other end of the room. She opened a drawer in the middle and pulled out a manilla file. The front of the file had Yuri's name neatly written on it.

Tachibana pulled out a paper and handed it to Yuri. "Please report to class on time tomorrow." she said before turning away and walking back to her seat. Thsi was their cue to leave, so Yuri followed Iwasawa out the door.

Iwasawa took the paper from Yuri's hand. "Your classroom is right down that hall." she said. "The door before the corner. Class starts at eight but you might want to be there early tomorrow. Some teachers start before eight. The last thing you want is to make a bad impression on your first day."

"I think that's already done." Yuri said, remembering the stares she got at the cafeteria when she walked in without a uniform.

"Oh you'll be fine. People forget everything within a few days here." she said, smiling. "Come on, let's get back to the dorms." She walked away and Yuri followed, relieved to have someone she could count on. Maybe school here wouldn't be so bad... she thought as she hurried down the hall.


End file.
